There’s a new dry cleaner in my neighborhood. I went there a couple of times and then I’ve been out of town for the past month or so and I just went for the third time and as I walked in the guy working said “Ty Bennett, right?” And it surprised me. I told him I was impressed with his ability to remember names. He played off the complement, but was very interactive and personable during my visit. It reminded me how powerful a name was and where I learned that lesson. A few years ago I had a speech in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I flew in late and got to the hotel. I asked if the restaurant at the hotel was open and they said that it wasn’t. They said that there was a Panera Bread down the street that I could walk to that would still be open. SoContinue Reading

On May 2, 2011, a group of Navy Seals stormed a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, successfully completing their operations of killing Osama Bin Laden. Since that day, it seems that the world has been fascinated with the Navy Seals, and rightfully so. There have been multiple best selling books like No Easy Day and Fearless and some big blockbusters like Lone Survivor and Zero Dark Thirty that have ridden the tide of public interest in the mystery that is the Navy Seals. Everyone wants to better understand what makes this group so successful. My personal fascination began last year when I had the privilege of sharing the stage with Kevin Lacz. Lacz is a former Navy Seal sniper, breacher and and combat medic. Since meeting him, I have read multiple books and studied more about their operations. One of the success secrets of the Seals is learning to get veryContinue Reading

One of the key lessons I teach leaders is that – People Support What They Help Create. Our world has changed, and rapidly. Fifteen years ago, if you wanted your voice to be heard, you pretty much only believed it was heard if you held a position of leadership. Social media has changed all that and I don’t mean just because people have Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIn where they can go and voice their opinion. It has changed the psyche of our world. It has caused everyone to feel like his or her voice should be heard. Regardless of where people are in your organization, they mentally believe that their voice and their opinion matters. As a result, our top-down directives don’t work the same way they used to. We can’t just throw things at people and expect them to jump on it, to run with it, and go forContinue Reading

One of my favorite stories illustrates the dramatic effect increased confidence will have in your life. It is story written in 1914 by Harry Leon Wilson, called Bunker Bean. Bunker Bean’s parents died when he was a child leaving him to grow up on the street. As an adult Bunker Bean struggled to survive. He was weak and timid as he lived in fear, struggling from job to job just to make ends meet. Then one day as he was living in a boarding house he met a man who was a spiritual medium. The man convinced Bunker Bean that he had special powers and he taught him about reincarnation. The medium taught him that people had lived before as other people, and that for enough money, he would tell Bunker Bean about his previous life. Bunker Bean scraped together the money after a couple of weeks and upon payingContinue Reading